My Love For You (Went Viral)
by Ghostandyouknowthis
Summary: Pitch Perfect AU. Beca's living her dream; nothing could possibly go wrong in her life right now. That's until she stumbles upon a PR firm in the heart of LA. Beca/Chloe
1. Chapter 1

**Fic title:** My Love For You (Went Viral)

**Pairing:** Beca/Chloe

**Rating:** T (for now)

**Summary:** Pitch Perfect AU. Beca's living her dream; nothing could possibly go wrong in her life right now. That's until she stumbles upon a PR firm in the heart of LA.

**A/N:** Also posting this on Tumblr but here it is here for anyone who likes this format better. Feedback is greatly appreciated.

* * *

Four top 10 hits (2 still on Billboard's Top 100), a number-one debut, a platinum album and now an AMA nomination—there is absolutely nothing that could possibly go wrong in Beca's life right now.

Like _nothing_.

Except her dad is looking at her with that disappointed frown of his, his eyes soft but pointed—critical even after all she's achieved.

She fucking hates it when he does this.

It's bad enough that he's even here—that after years of constantly bickering and fighting, the only thing her parents could conclusively agree on was that the only way she was skipping out on college to purse her dream in LA was if her dad tagged along to "manage" her career (otherwise known as babysit her like she's five or something). And instead of even doing that, he was too busy shacking up with—_marrying_, even!—the bimbo dragon lady who actually wants her to call her mom. Now, with her career in full swing—because she's been smart, creating fresh beats, sampling the best of old ones, and delving deep into the worlds of indie pop-rock and underground rap to find fresh new vocals—he has the nerve to actually try to "manage" her.

God, he pisses her off so much sometimes.

"Beca." She shakes her head as soon as he sighs her name. She's so ready to tune him out or else brace herself for another argument. "I'm worried about you Becs. You have to stop doing this to yourself."

"Doing what exactly, dad?" she asks, steeling herself (_bulletproof_, _nothing to lose_—David Guetta has been the soundtrack to this crazy journey of her life) for whatever ego blow or guilt trip or cheap shot he intends to land.

His frown deepens, showing his age in crinkles around his eyes and at the corner of his lips.

"This antisocial thing you've gotten so good at." The frustration is easily distinguished in the strain of his voice—it's something that only serves to piss Beca off even more. "You've been in Los Angeles for what? 3 years now? You still don't have any friends. You won't visit Sheila and me unless I bribe you. All you do is lock yourself up in your studio for hours on end and that roommate of yours wouldn't even check on you if she thought you were dead—"

"She would definitely check on me if I were dead!" She argues for argument's sake. "I mean, she'd have to yell at me for the stench disturbing her studying, so…"

"Beca," He's using the stern fatherly voice now—Beca really resists the urge to roll her eyes. "It's not healthy for you. It's not good for you or your career."

"My career?" She's incensed, gritting her teeth against saying something she really doesn't mean even though the words are forthcoming. "Maybe you really haven't realized _dad_, but my career is going great. Not that you'd care! My album went Platinum and you didn't even congratulate me. You're just so against me living my life the way I want that you refuse to acknowledge when I've done something right!"

He sighs, soft and defenseless. That's another thing she hates when he does—he's just so levelheaded even when he's got her blood boiling.

"You career is going fantastic." He admits, guiltless, even now—even though this is the first time he's ever said something positive in regards to her music."And I'm proud of you. Both your mother and I are so _so_ proud of you but have you stopped for a moment to think about what's next?"

"I keep making music." It's simple. She doesn't have to think about it.

He's rubbing his temple now, annoyed with her even though he refuses to raise his voice about it like she'll do to him.

"I take about a hundred calls every day from people trying to book you for concerts or events and you ask me to decline every single one of them. You refuse to appear in your own music videos. You haven't even physically met with anyone who has done vocals on one of your songs. Your fans don't even know you're a girl, Beca! The mystery may be all the rage now but what's next? A Grammy performance behind a brick wall? Are you even planning to show up to the award show you're nominated for?"

"I—maybe?" She hadn't really thought about going to the award show—she's content with just the nomination, just like she's content with all the praise for her music without the praise for her face. "I just—I don't think people need to know me to like my music is all."

"But what's the harm in people knowing you?"

"I—nothing," she stammers. "I don't know!"

He smiles, like he's got her right where he wants her.

He probably does.

"I'll cut you a deal."

Beca groans.

"I never like your deals."

"Hear me out, okay?" He asks, half-smirking in that way her mom always used to hate—it's no wonder it's like the only thing she's ever adopted from him.

"I'm listening."

"Your award show is in two months. Work yourself out of hiding before then, hire a publicist to do it right if you're worried about ramifications to your career; whatever—do whatever you have to do to actually get yourself out there and then go to the show. If you do, then I'll cut you loose to make all these career decisions on your own. You can even hire a brand spanking new manager. Heck, you can even hire that ex-rapper guy with all the gold chains and the hoes!"

"Dad," she sighs, seriously resisting the urge to bang her head against his desk. "I don't know."

He looks so hopeful, like he already knows her answer before she even knows it.

She sighs again—that desk is looking like the perfect place for her head right about now.

"Think about it at least?"

"I guess."

* * *

Bellas Agency is the first PR firm to pop up in her Google search and because she really doesn't care enough to keep looking, it's her first choice.

Probably not the best choice, she realizes, once the secretary—who looks at her like she's the first sign of civilization she's seen in decades (_weird_.)—gives her the go ahead to go right into the main office.

There's this cynical part of her brain that's expecting this exaggerated caricature of corporate America—like a creativity sucking black hole of dull fitted suits and even duller personalities.

No part of her brain—not even the most irrational, petulant part that usually comes into play at the same time her dad's plans do—could prepare her for what she actually gets.

There's a desk, a blonde women clutching onto it, dry heaving (maybe even crying) and a redhead patting the blonde's back delicately, simulating these exaggerated deep breaths that the blonde is doing a horrible job at replicating through her gagging.

It's like she's walked right into a post breakup scene in a chick flick.

Or a demented kind of child birth.

Or Wall Street as the stock market crashes.

"Yikes," slips from her lips before she can even help herself (or hope to make a quick invisible getaway) and she's met instantly with a sharp scowl from the blonde (at least she's stopped gagging) and a smile bright enough to light the universe from the redhead.

She was pretty freakin' sure this was a bad idea before she even entered the building and when the redhead (who is as pretty as she is bizarrely happy, Beca notes _really_, _really_ briefly in the midst of thinking up an escape plan) starts on _and on_ about public image and how they can influence it through social media and branding and word of _mouth_, she's at least one hundred and fifty percent fucking sure that she will never listen to her dad's advice ever again.

She gets away with a lie about being in the wrong building and she absolutely doesn't look back.

Not even at the redhead with the eager smile and pretty blue eyes.


	2. Chapter 2

Kimmy Jin all but kicks her ass out of their apartment with her patented glare of doom and three choice words of destruction: _group_ _study session_.

She ends up at the gym which is kind of a good thing because her gym membership only gets used like once a year and after an hour on the treadmill she at least feels like she's run off her junk food induced ass.

She absolutely hates public showers but she's disgustingly sweaty and almost positive that Kimmy Jin's friends are waiting up in the living room just to stare at the freak white girl, so lesser of two evils and stuff.

(Also the gym has the fluffiest cotton towels ever. So there's that.)

At least the water's hot. Like heavenly melts away the tension in her shoulders hot. So much better than having to blast music to tune out the scientific musings of Kimmy Jin plus friends.

She lets this calm wash over her, relaxing under the pulsing stream of water. The droplets splatter and crash against the hard tile floor, creating a steady tempo that her brain just can't help but add melody to. The music just sorta flows out of her. There's a synth bassline pumping in her head, mixing with these heavy dance riffs and sporadic snare beats. She doesn't sing very often (only when she's trying to figure out how someone else's vocals will fit with her instrumental) but she's singing now, intoning _Titanium _against the shower's percussion and her brain's own little remix.

"You're a singer!"

"Oh my God!" Beca shrieks, startled by the unexpected voice and even more so by the unexpected presence she finds _right behind her_ when she spins toward the source of said voice. "Dude!" she just barely avoids a concussion as she scrambles for something to cover herself, just scarcely catching the shower curtain without falling and hauling it so she's at least mostly covered. _Unlike_ the redhead, who is very naked and raising an eyebrow at her like she's the crazy one here. "Are you stalking me?" Beca asks, backing herself into a corner (self defense 101—disappear and maybe the attacker will lose you?) and rolling her eyes skyward, away from all the expanses of skin at eyelevel (so not the kind of distraction she needs right now).

"No." The girl says, simple, like Beca should just take her word for it.

Beca's not exactly comforted.

"So you just burst into strangers' showers often then?"

"We're not exactly strangers."

Beca gapes at her, not entirely sure if she's being serious. Then again, she's clearly crazy, so probably serious.

"Dude, _I don't know you_!" She tries to tone down the hysterics that makes its way into her voice but the longer she stands here exposed (the shower curtain only does so much), the more her voice breaks. "That is like the dictionary definition of stranger!"

"Oh!" The redhead smiles at her, so completely at ease with this like she honest to God doesn't see anything wrong here. "I'm Chloe," she extends her hand for Beca to shake but Beca's kinda preoccupied with trying to keep her modesty intact. Chloe doesn't appear to mind the snub; she uses the extended hand to shut off the running water (well, apparently her shower's over). "From the Bellas. The PR firm you—"

"Yeah, I know where you're from. I'm just—" _showering _(she's not really anymore), _busy_, _a tiny bit scared, trying really fucking hard not to let her eyes wander past collarbone_? "kinda nude here!"

Chloe waves her hand dismissively (_right_, why would she be anything but indifferent to the nudity?) before crossing her arms right beneath her chest (Beca's so not looking).

"So, _honestly_, why were you at the firm?" she asks, swaying just a tiny bit closer (seriously, the wall is becoming Beca's bestie at this point. Or part of her. She really wouldn't mind if she could just phase through it right about now). "Nobody ever really finds the Bellas without looking so I know you were lying about being in the wrong building."

_Busted._

She has a feeling her that usual method of deny everything will get her nowhere right now, not with the intense way the redhead is looking at her (_Jesus_, her eyes are like really, really blue); it's like Chloe can see right through her (she clutches the curtain closer just in case).

"I—" She doesn't know where to begin. There are a few truths bouncing around in her head like 'I was there 'cause my dad's being a jerk and I left because I'm pretty sure you and your friend are crazy or 'I was there because I'm at a defining point in my career and I have no idea how to continue on my own but I'm pretty sure you and your friend are creativity sucking vampires, so, yeah.'

Her hesitation earns her a raised eyebrow and a step even closer.

"You are a singer, right? I mean, Aubrey thought that maybe you were a Disney actor gone rogue but the headphones were a dead giveaway,"

Beca goes to correct her – or at least object to being likened to a lame Disney channel star—but she gets a distraction in the form of Chloe touching her; like actually reaching out, fingertips on skin, sweeping across her collarbone where her headphones usually sit. She swears the smile that spreads across Chloe's lips is a direct result of her surprised flinch.

"Plus," Chloe practically sings the word, grinning like she's caught Beca with her hand stuck in the cookie jar. "I just heard you singing. You were singing Titanium, right?"

"You—uh. You know David Guetta?" Beca asks, furrowing her eyebrows in surprise. She doesn't really know what she expects publicists to listen to but David Guetta isn't it.

(Well, there goes her creativity sucking vampire theory).

"Have I been living under a rock?" Chloe jokes. "Yeah! That song is my jam!" (It's kinda Beca's jam too but she doesn't say it). "My lady jam," Chloe adds, suddenly conspiratorial.

"Uhmm, that's nice?"

"It is. The song really builds, you know?"

She does know. There's just something about the way David Guetta manages to spin these hard house beats around Sia's deep vocals that just gets her blood flowing like…

_Oh_.

Her brain finally catches up to the seductive lilt around Chloe's words and she flushes so hard she's pretty sure she's glowing red.

"Gross."

"Can you sing it for me?" Chloe asks, blatantly hopeful.

"Dude, no!" Beca hisses. This conversation with a naked person in the shower thing has been weird since Chloe decided to invade her shower but she's completely unprepared for the turn for the kinky this thing has taken. "Get out!"

Chloe rolls her eyes at her.

"Not for that reason," she argues.

Whatever the reason, Beca's so not singing for her.

Chloe raises an eyebrow, placing her hands on her hips and sighing dramatically.

"I'm not leaving until you sing," she says, making a show of her patience with crossed arms and a little lopsided smile.

Beca gauges the small distance between Chloe and her escape and reluctantly deems a fully covered getaway completely impossible. She looks back to Chloe with her sparkling blue eyes and calm unwavering smile.

She has a feeling she really isn't getting out of this.

So, she sings.

She's really not used to singing in front of people (especially not naked people—God, it's so distracting) but she lets the melody surge out of her, determined to get the song out without err.

She's not really expecting Chloe to join in but she does and Beca is completely unprepared for the rich resonance that comes out of the girl.

Chloe sounds amazing! Like maybe a creativity sucking vampire who sucks the creativity from other people and uses it all for herself kind of amazing.

Her voice is mesmerizing, soft but polished whereas Beca's is kind of rough around the edges from infrequent use.

The mellow hum wraps around her and in her head there's a detonation of synth drums, fast and hard, mixing easily with Chloe's smooth hum.

She can't help but return the smile that Chloe flashes at her when their harmony dies down. She thinks about the number of mixes she's started and abandoned, unable to find the right kind of vocals to blend with the way she wants the song to sound. Chloe would sound perfect on at least half of them.

Before she can even breach the subject (and explain who she is and what exactly she does), Chloe's tugging on her wrists, pulling her almost impossibly close.

(_Still_ very much naked.)

"Hey," Chloe's holding her wrists delicately between them, intently keeping eye contact. "I know most people don't ever consider needing a publicist until they're in trouble or something but whatever reason you came into the firm, it doesn't matter, ok? You're _so_ talented and nothing should overshadow that. That's what our firm is for, making sure nothing overshadows that; so you should consider coming back in to discuss whatever it was bothering you, ok?"

Beca doesn't even get a chance to respond before Chloe is handing her a towel with that little lopsided smile of hers and then finally, she's alone.

She hears a retreating "see you tomorrow at the office at 8," and she's left clutching the towel to her chest wondering what the hell just happened and what kind of person under the age of 40 is actually awake at 8!


	3. Chapter 3

She's an hour late to her appointment thingy.

(In her ultimate defense, she set her alarm with the intent to be on time but then she kinda just rolled over and went back to sleep until her second alarm went off like half an hour later.)

It was super early, so she can't really be blamed.

Except, yes, she can apparently very much be blamed and _is_ being blamed because her lateness seems to have incurred the ire of Chloe's partner, Aubrey.

Or her face has incurred the ire of Aubrey...

Actually, she's not really sure what it is that's making Aubrey so mad but if the scowl is anything to go by then it's pretty obvious that the blonde just clearly doesn't like her.

Chloe, on the other hand, _really_ likes her—she tugged her closer than talking distance and told her so as soon as she stepped foot in the building.

Now she's sitting at this scarily polished mahogany desk across from this soft, patient smile and this wicked scowl and she's sort of (definitely) wondering if maybe Chloe's actually a creativity sucking vampire who uses that talent all for her voice and then hypnotizes people with it.

Or with her eyes.

Or her smile.

Because Beca can practically feel Aubrey's concentrated gaze burning into her face and despite her impromptu extra half an hour of sleep, it's still far too early for this (and since when did she start listening to her dad anyway?) but for some reason (a magnetic sort of voice that would sound amazing on some of her mixes kind of reason), she isn't making another excuse to ditch; instead, she's concentrating on that soft, hopeful smile of Chloe's and trying her hardest to formulate words that are proving to be far harder than they really should be.

She's not used to having to put words to these kinda things; her music has spoken for her for so long that she can't even really think of another way to express herself so she just pulls out her phone and plays the one song that anyone who's heard of her music would know: her debut single.

A gentle pulse of percussion sounds from the phone's tiny speaker (first a modified kick on each beat then the sporadic addition of vibrating hi-hats, all layered atop a tight line of machine gun snare).

She watches the confusion spread across Chloe's face—her brow furrows and her nose crinkles but her smile doesn't fade; it just turns into something less hopeful and more playful (more reminiscent of that little lopsided grin in the shower, like she's caught Beca with her hand in the cookie jar, _again_).

A deep bass line fades right beneath the track and then the sporadic hi-hats crescendo and tumble into an echo of syncopated synth sounds before the vocals fade in.

It had been tough finding vocals for that song when she was working on it. She had contacted about a hundred people but being relatively unknown and trying to keep her anonymity intact, no one (or their agents) really wanted to jump on a train that seemed destined for wreckage. Eventually though, she found this East Coast rapper named Tony who was willing to communicate entirely through email.

Not much of a money and hos rapper, Tony's genuine verses about his struggles and adversaries blended right into her hard hitting instrumental and she released the track online. With no chorus to be heard and an abundance of spiraling breakbeats, she wasn't really expecting the track to go anywhere but it rocked through the underground house and hip-hop scenes and eventually went to number 1 in the Netherlands. And then Spain. And then the UK. Then she got so sick of hearing it on the radio in the US that she practically locked herself in her studio and didn't come out until like a month later with 16 polished tracks that eventually found vocals and became her first album.

She still emails Tony sometimes (he's working on his debut album, having signed to this big shot record company that he hates) and he still refers to her as "homie" having never been given a name and probably having never thought that she's a white girl from Oregon. She wonders how people are gonna react to that detail (she kinda wants to lock herself in her studio where no one can judge her based on anything but her music just so she never finds out).

The song fades into its ending and ebbs into the silence of a room where she's still sitting at a desk across from a patient, even brighter smile and a wicked (even wickeder? It's possible) scowl and she still doesn't quite know what to say.

"So, I'm not a singer," she starts. "But I—uhhmm," she gestures vaguely to her phone. "This is me. This is what I do."

"You're DJ Béchamel?"

There's no judgment (or even surprise) in Chloe's voice or her soft, curious gaze but Beca feels more exposed in front of her now than she did when she was actually exposed in that shower.

It's just that she's never had to make the connection before. Clearly, she knows who she is; it's her —it was her hands on the mixer, her eyes that became bloodshot after sleepless nights in front of her Macbook. She hummed out ideas that later became melodies, she scoured through hundred of songs looking for vocalists then scoured through contact information when she found ones she wanted to work with. She even picked the name for God's sake (why did she pick such a stupid name again?) but it's still weird to associate this entity with herself. It feels like she's joining two beings; like she's peeling away these notions already associated with this mysterious radio phenomenon and adding her skin and her eyes and her hands.

She's opening herself to this whole world of judgment and it's kind of fucking scary.

"I—" she almost wants to backtrack, to take it back somehow and make a run for it, but Chloe's smiling at her, so patient and hopeful, and she's gotta do this at some point, right?

She nods—it's small (maybe even a little bit timid) but it's an affirmative.

Chloe smiles so brightly that it's dizzying (Beca's kinda glad there's a table between them because she has a feeling that if it weren't, Chloe would definitely being doing that thing where she gets far too close for comfort).

"That's so cool!" She gushes.

One glance at Aubrey affirms what Beca could have guessed; she definitely doesn't share Chloe's opinion.

"So what have you gotten yourself into?" she asks way harsher than Beca thinks she warrants. "Drugs? A sex scandal?"

"Aubrey!" There's a whole silent conversation between Chloe and Aubrey that Beca's just not privy to but she assumes there's something in there about Aubrey being just plain mean because Aubrey clears her throat and when she speaks again, it's still kind of harsh but a bit more professional.

"It's nothing personal," she insists. "I just think that if we're going to take you on as a client then we should be completely honest with each other from the beginning. So if there are any _vices_ that we'll be dealing with in the future, it's best we know about them now."

"I don't—It's nothing like that!" Beca argues. "It's just that I recently got nominated for an AMA."

"Best new artist." Chloe fills in for her and Beca wonders briefly how much she already knows about her (or this entity that she's finally allowing to be part of her).

"Right, best new artist," she agrees. "The thing is, I don't have a public image yet and I kinda have no idea how to go about getting one?"

Chloe looks a bit too excited by the prospect of taking her on as a project and Aubrey looks mildly curious, and Beca's about ready to jump into the grave she's quite sure she's digging for herself because it's suddenly clear that this is really happening; she's about to tear down quite possibly the biggest wall she's put up to protect herself and she's handing over the sledgehammers to a woman who clearly doesn't like her and one who likes her to a terrifying degree.

She is clearly losing her mind (or she's hypnotized; she's still not ruling that out).

"Right," It's Aubrey who finally speaks up. "We're probably going to be working closely with the rest of your team so we'll need contact information a.s.a.p."

"My team?"

"Like your crew?" Chloe intones. "Stylist? Close protection? Etc?"

"Yeah, I don't really have any of that." Beca admits.

She doesn't really like the look that Chloe and Aubrey share at her words but she's in the middle of LA so how hard could finding all that stuff be?

Really fucking hard apparently, she finds out after Aubrey sighs and hands over her ipad displaying a Youtube video.

The thing is, Beca doesn't really concern herself with things that happen in the music industry that don't directly affect her but even she heard about what happened at last year's Grammys when the sweet-faced, chastity vowing, purity ring toting pop singer affectionately dubbed "America's sweetheart" showed up so drunk that she was barely able to walk straight. After a slurred slew of interviews that undermined everything she was supposed to believe in and a performance that got censored like a rap piece and then cut short, most people were expecting her to kind of just pass out in a corner or end up puking on herself; of course it was a surprise and a Youtube sensation when instead, she ended up being puked on by a member of her own "team" right as she was going to give an acceptance speech that was probably better off never having been heard.

It was kinda hilarious—so hilarious that it made the Bellas Agency a laughing stock within the music industry because that puking member of her team? Yeah, that was apparently Aubrey (which explains so much) and the Bellas Agency? Not really brimming with people who want to be associated with anyone associated with them.

So Beca hadn't woken up this morning prepared to spend her whole day at a PR firm, but she does—she spends literally the whole day watching Aubrey make frantic phone calls and jot down new notes on a flow chart she's named "Road to the AMAs." She spends the whole day with Chloe getting way too close to her (telling her how much she loves her music and how excited she is to be working for her) but not quite finding the right words to ask the redhead to sing for one of her tracks. She spends the whole day waiting for a least one person to bite on one of the job listings Aubrey's sent out and is really about to just give up and call it a day when Aubrey's secretary (Ashley, maybe? Beca's not really sure because Aubrey has two distinctly different secretaries who she calls Ashley and Beca doesn't know if they're both Ashley or if Aubrey's just too busy freaking out all the time to realize that they're different people) knocks on the door to tell them that someone is waiting in the lobby—someone who has worked as an assistant for Madonna.

That someone—an Australian girl who legit introduces herself as "Fat Amy"— is hilarious and hired instantly despite her claim that Madonna almost bit her arm off once (yeah, Madonna turns out to be "the biggest, baddest Croc in all of Tasmania! Which Madonna did you think I was talking about?" but whatever).

People start filtering in steadily after that.

Most of them are certifiably insane which is scary but a few are not so bad.

Take the pair of bodyguards, Cynthia-Rose and Lily, for instance. Ok, so maybe they actually fit quite comfortably into the certifiably insane category as well but when Chloe asked why they work as a pair, Cynthia Rose dubbed herself the _protection_ portion of the pair and Lily said something (nobody actually knows what she said) that Cynthia Rose later intoned as her being the _retaliation_ portion of the pair and Aubrey freaked out so hard that Beca could literally see the vein in her neck bulge and thus she hired them instantly just to see the sharp glare that Aubrey sent her way.

She doesn't get her way quite as easily with the stylist portion of her crew. The thing is, she doesn't really think she needs a stylist at all but Chloe really liked the guy wearing the shirt that looked like someone chucked a rainbow at it and Aubrey really liked the girl who looked like a 60s flight attendant so Beca supposes that the girl they can all agree on (Stacie, who really isn't wearing much of anything to even really judge her style on) is a relatively fair compromise.

And just like that, Beca has herself a team— assembled, on her payroll (she's actually paying people; what kinda crazy world is this?), and ready to go with an Aubrey approved stamp of "be here tomorrow morning at 8 AM _sharp_." (Yeah, the "sharp" was directed at her with a glare but whatever, Beca might just have found a new pastime in seeing just how far she can push Aubrey anyway.)

She's finally set to leave (and go home to sleep because 8 AM, seriously?) when Chloe loops an arm through hers and offers to/insists that she walk her to her car. Beca doesn't even flinch at the sudden contact because after spending all day with the redhead, she's kind of desensitized to it and she also doesn't even comment on the weirdness that is Chloe taking them the longest possible secluded roundabout back way to the car park because well, whatever, Chloe could bite her and transfer her vampiric qualities right now and her day could still not get any weirder.

'Cause she has a team for God's sake; a team with a crocodile wrestling assistant, a pair of possibly violent body guards, a stylist who may not even like clothes judging by what she wears, a publicist who loses her lunch under pressure and Chloe.

Chloe, with her magnetic voice and hypnotizing eyes, who seems unable to talk without touching and who bursts into strangers' showers with her simple straightforwardness and effortless patience.

Chloe who she's finally completely alone with, with this question that's kinda been on her mind since she left that shower last night still rattling around in her brain.

"You should sing for some of my mixes," ok, so she doesn't really mean to just blurt it out right in the middle of Chloe's assessment of what a brilliant success today has been but she does.

So maybe today can actually get a little weirder because Chloe, who has been gushing about how much she loves her music all day, who sang so brazenly with her in the shower of all places, doesn't look at all excited by the prospect. In fact, it's really quick but she sees a glimpse of sadness in the sudden drag of Chloe's lips and the abrupt turbulence of usually crystal clear eyes before Chloe smiles (it's still not quite the same), gently nudging her with her shoulder.

"That's really nice of you and I would but I just—"she trails off, biting her bottom lip like she's weighing her words carefully. "I don't sing anymore."

There's something about the way she says it—something surprisingly careful (guarded even) for a girl like Chloe; Beca really wants to ask why that is and what she means by she doesn't sing because she does sing—or at least she did sing in the shower and she sounded like really, really good—but there's something about that look—that quick rush of sadness—that makes her hold her tongue.

"Oh," she says instead and she surprises herself with how disappointed she really sounds. She's kinda disappointed she supposes, but not enough not to rush to cover the sudden lapse. "I mean, yeah, no, that's cool."

"Hey," Chloe tugs them to a halt like right in front of Beca's car (creativity sucking vampire psychic, maybe?) She detaches herself from Beca before grabbing her by her wrists instead and squeezing lightly. "I'm so glad you decided to do this with the Bellas. I—," she draws closer; it's so quick that Beca barely even has a chance to panic before she's practically blanketed by red hair and held almost breathless by a startlingly blue gaze. "I think we're gonna be really fast friends."

"Well," Beca swallows hard, racking her brain for something to say. "You saw me naked so…"

Chloe smiles, bright and easy, squeezing her wrists again.

"So, I'll see you tomorrow?" she asks, oddly hopeful like Beca hasn't already gotten herself in too deep to make another getaway. "At 8 AM!" (Not a detail Beca is likely to forget.) "_Sharp_," she adds with an Aubrey-esque inflection and a teasing wink before releasing her, leaving her to _once again_ wonder what the hell just happened(and just when she thought she was desensitized to that girl).

Whatever.

It's not really that weird that she actually kinda wants to be on time tomorrow.

Ok, so maybe it is really weird but today has been the weirdest fucking day ever anyway.

TBC…


	4. Chapter 4

She's makes it to the office on time (actually, she's a few minutes late but it's as close to on time as she's gonna get at 8 AM so she's proud of herself regardless). Unfortunately, Aubrey isn't around to witness the miracle.

Neither is Chloe.

She doesn't have time to reflect on the disappointment the revelation generates because there's a cup of coffee being thrust into her hands (wow, this paying people thing is actually kind of awesome) and Amy's standing in front of her, staring like she has something to say but doesn't quite know where to begin.

"Uhmm… thanks for the coffee," Beca murmurs.

Apparently the acknowledgment is all Amy needs to relieve her of her hesitance because she moves to sit in the chair next to Beca's.

"So, I've been meaning to tell you this," she starts, oddly conspiratorial, which is weird since they only met—very briefly at that— yesterday so what could she possibly have to divulge to her already? "See, the thing is," she says, hushed like anyone else is really paying attention to them—Beca checks just in case and no one is. "Assistant isn't really the best job title for me."

"Oh?" Beca indulges her because A.) the coffee is really good and B.) Amy seems pretty harmless on the scale of one to crazy.

"Yeah, I was thinking something more along the lines of _political advisor_."

"Political advisor?" Beca repeats.

"Yeah, don't worry; I've got plenty of experience. I was an advisor to a member of parliament once. We made little people line dancing illegal on Saturdays in Tasmania,"

"Wow."

"So, I'm thinking for you, we'll start really small you know, like governor first and then we just go right for it and make a grab for the presidency."

"Yeah!" Beca chuckles, thoroughly amused by Amy's antics, except, there's this terrifying moment of clarity where Amy doesn't look at all amused and Beca realizes it's because she's being totally serious. "Wait, no!" Beca shakes her head. "I have no intention of getting into politics!"

"Good thing I have a wide range of very useful skills," Amy insists. "Like cheerleading. I could be your personal cheerleader?" She suggests. "I was the best cheerleader in Tasmania! Well, I was the only cheerleader in Tasmania—_with teeth_," she grins and Beca makes a mental note to move her into the clinically insane category which officially makes 3 out of 4 (she glances at Stacie just in case and finds the stylist—still not wearing very much—casually filing her nails; she hasn't done anything completely off the wall _yet_, so that's something). "I can make up a cheer for you right now!" Amy proposes. "Like right now; right on spot. Are you ready this?"

"Uhhmm, ok?"

Amy gets out of her seat, demonstrating a really complex hopping, clapping thingy.

"GOOOOOOOOOOO!" She drags the word out for longer than should be humanly possible before trailing off into a breathless, jumbled, "_I-really-don't-know-who-you-are._" She catches her breath for a moment, smiling in a way Beca supposes is supposed to be charming. "Actually," she continues. "We _all_ really don't know who you are," she emphasizes the 'all' and Beca glances up to find Cynthia-Rose, Lily and Stacie all staring at her expectantly. "I mean, the cheerleading thing is totally true and you should really reconsider the running for president thing, but this has all been a charade to find out exactly who you are," Amy admits. "I drew the short straw."

"Oh, uhmmm," Beca figures she should have some kind of thought out explanation for this already—it's an explanation that she'll probably have to rehash quite a bit over the next couple of months—but this was an oversight she wasn't quite prepared for. 'Cause she has a "team" for Christ's sake (she's still not over that), a team who have officially become invested in her career and her safety and her shoes and stuff; a team who also have absolutely no idea who she is or even what she does but are here anyway ready to do their jobs regardless of their lack of information. It probably shouldn't be comforting that they're almost as out of their depth here as she is but she breathes just a bit easier because of it which is probably why she feels less apprehensive revealing this secret to them than she did to Aubrey and Chloe yesterday.

"I'm Beca," she offers up. "A DJ," she explains. "Well, a kind of popular DJ actually, except nobody really knows that yet," she rambles, receiving four blank stares in response. "Uhmm, have you heard of DJ Béchamel?" she asks, changing her tactic. She gets four nods. "Well, that's me," she confesses. "But I don't want people to know that. Or I _didn't _want people to know that. I'm kinda taking steps towards being more open with that now," she admits. "So, yeah…"

She's not exactly sure what kind of response she was expecting but she kinda hopes the rest of this weird journey will be this easy because Cynthia Rose just nods and tells her that she really liked her debut track, Amy goes on a weird spiel about saving a DJ from a crocodile once, Stacie shrugs and says one time she banged a really hot DJ and Lily says something that Beca's just gonna take as recognition because she honestly just can't hear her and she can't be the only one that finds that weird, right?

And just like that she has a team who are strange and actually pretty cool all at once and who, most importantly, really don't care if she doesn't exactly live up to any preconceived expectations of this radio phenomenon who she is very slowly filling into.

It's actually a pretty freeing feeling but she doesn't have a chance to bask in the ease of it all before Aubrey storms into the office, arms full of magazines and lips twisted in her usual show of polite aggression.

"This is so PR-dictable!" She says, flinging the stack of magazines onto the desk in front of Beca.

"PR-dictable?" Amy repeats—before Beca has a chance to—testing the word carefully, like it's the strangest thing she's ever heard an American say (which it just might be since it's the weirdest thing Beca's ever heard anyone say).

Aubrey ignores the blatant ridicule, turning instead to angrily jot something on her Road to the AMAs flow chart.

Beca squints to read the pretentious red marker, just barely making out the words: "destroy the Trebles!"

"The Trebles," Aubrey turns to explain, enunciating her words with a practiced calm even through gritted teeth. "have wormed their newest golden boy into the spotlight again." She says, gesturing to the strewn magazines.

Beca glances at the papers noting that they're all featuring the same baby-faced brunette singer guy— which still means absolutely nothing to her whatsoever.

"What are the Trebles?" she asks, addressing Chloe who snuck in a little after Aubrey did. She's really hoping the redhead can shed some light on her partner's new wave of crazy. Also, she was kinda looking for an excuse to acknowledge Chloe anyway so two birds and stuff.

"The Treblemakers," Chloe clarifies, flashing Beca one of her bright smiles. "It's this talent agency right across the street. They're kinda a bit more than a talent agency though. Once they've latched onto a client, it's pretty much guaranteed fame at the expense of the Trebles pretty much controlling _everything_. They've got accountants, managers, agents, publicists all on hand; I even heard they've got real estate agents. Anyway, they're really known for—"

"Constantly manufacturing a line of egotistical, pretty boy, teen heartthrobs to devastate the music industry with their boyish sex appeal and pitchy falsettos." Aubrey intones. "Case in point," she gestures back to the magazines. "Jesse."

"Jesse?" Beca asks, feeling completely out of the loop.

"Honestly, do you just not live in the real world at all?" Aubrey asks. (Beca really would take offense to that except she lives in an apartment like a minute away from UCLA so really, no, she's not sure that really counts as the real world at all.) "He's nominated against you for Best New Artist!" Aubrey continues. "It's pretty much a race between you and him since the other two nominees don't have even half the amount of record sales you do. It's a Popularity contest from here on out. The winner will pretty much be whoever generates the right kind of media buzz at the right time up until the ceremony. Unless teen girls suddenly stop wanting to throw their panties at him overnight, then he's pretty much a shoo-in to win."

"Well, he _is_ a pretty hot piece of man meat," Amy murmurs, with a shrug, flipping through one of the magazines from the stack.

"If I were wearing panties, I'd throw them at him," Stacie agrees.

Beca swears for a moment, she actually sees Cynthia Rose duck her head to assess that statement. Weird. Whatever. Luckily, Aubrey wants to move on from the comment just as much as Beca does.

"As I was saying," Aubrey hisses, tone sharp, redirecting the room's attention back to her. "Jesse has canceled a TV appearance to go to a charity event tonight and the media is already painting him as the patron saint of activism. It's a pretty casual event; invite-only so it won't be crammed with the media or anything; just celebrities wine and dining and donating to a good cause."

"Well, that's nice," Beca mumbles, glancing idly at the glossy magazine pages (she really can't imagine her face being spattered on one of these things). "But I really don't get what any of this has to do with me," she admits.

Aubrey pulls a small, elegantly embroidered enveloped from her bag and hands it to her. Beca eyes it warily, noting that it's addressed to her or addressed to the radio phenomenon that she's slowly filling into.

She doesn't even have to open it before realization creeps in.

"Chloe pulled a lot of strings to get you an invite to this event," Aubrey states, confirming Beca's suspicion.

That entrancing little lopsided smile that Chloe sends her way can't even offset Beca's sudden dread.

It's just so soon is all. She's still getting used to this small group of people associating her music with her face; she wasn't expecting this thing to move so quickly.

"But wait," she reasons, "you just said it yourself, it's not gonna be crammed with media and even if it were, nobody actually knows who I am. What good is there in me going to this thing?"

"There will be a lot of important people there. Singers, actors, you name it. This is a great opportunity to start getting yourself out there within the industry," Aubrey justifies. "Make these connections and then it'll be one appearance after another until you're as easily recognized as your name."

"But I—" she supposes Aubrey has a point because she can't even come up with a valid counterpoint. She reaches for something—anything—to get her out of this and settles with a weak: "But I don't even have anything to wear."

It's Stacie who perks up at this, grinning in a way Beca can't describe as anything but lecherous (it's like she only has one mode and it's seduction).

"Shopping is kinda my forte!" she confesses, excited.

"Oh, yay," Beca mutters with all the sarcasm she can muster.

She's mulling over a dive head first into a mahogany desk (or simply running away and never looking back) when Chloe finds her way in front of her, invading her space in that easy way she does.

Beca doesn't recoil and Chloe latches onto the subtle invitation, giving Beca's bicep a playful squeeze.

"It won't be so bad," she hums softly, smiling that simple, patient smile that got Beca into this mess in the first place. Or second place. Or third place. (In fact, Chloe has a knack for drawing her back in when she's about ready to just run.) "I promise," Chloe adds, with a teasing wink and an airy chuckle.

With that soft smile and magnetic blue gaze, Beca almost believes her.

Except Aubrey announces that she'll be joining her and Stacie on their shopping trip and well, a_lmost_ was always the operative word.

She so doesn't know if she's ready for this.

TBC...


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: _Thanks for all the reviews so far guys! I'm really, really gonna try to stop updating at a snail's pace, I promise lol_

* * *

The shopping trip from hell (which takes hours—literal _hours_— only to affirm that _yes_, Amy is crazy but not so bad and _yes_, Stacie is more than likely a bit off her rocker too but in a very specific, very sexual manner that Beca actually finds herself not at all bothered by, and _of course, definitely one hundred percent yes_, Aubrey is intolerable levels of insane) actually yields a not so bad outfit. The shirt, despite Stacie's insistence that she leave the top three buttons undone, is not unlike the shirt that she had been wearing in the first place and the pants, handpicked by Aubrey and thus far more formal than she'd usually wear, actually fit really well.

Still, she spends long minutes in front of the mirror that Aubrey had Amy drag into the office (seriously, agreeing on an outfit took so long—literal hours— that she didn't even have time to go back to her apartment to change for this stupid thing) just staring at her reflection and mindlessly buttoning and unbuttoning (and buttoning again) the shirt until the cotton actually crinkles under the pressure of her fingers.

It's not nerves or anything—not really— because she's got confidence in her music.

Her music is_ her_.

She lays herself bare in every slide of a knob on her mixer. (She exposes her longing through every compound meter; she frees suppressed anger in every swift beat per minute; she lets her passion erupt through kick and snare and modulated basslines and atypical beatmatching.) She gives herself through her music—it's her innermost thoughts, her greatest fears and desires all neatly (and sometimes not so neatly) arranged into beats and meters and chord progressions.

Music is her comfort zone. It's her escape and her disguise. For as long as she can remember, she's laid all of her confidence in her ability to create a sort of retreat through rhythm and melody; now, she's slowly realizing (or not so slowly because it sort of thuds in like a bassline riff with little or no lead in) she's kind of got like no confidence in the girl beneath the notes.

She's really got nothing to add to this radio phenomenon but a face and years of well practiced, sharp tongued sarcasm that she constantly uses to detract anyone from delving deeper into anything but her music.

Her anonymity is her last line of defense; she's not sure what people are looking for beneath the music or even what they'll find when she's stripped of hers, but she's almost certain that she doesn't want to find out.

She's really thinking of calling this whole thing off (she's even calculated the distance from the third floor to the ground just in case she decides to make a quick escape via the window) when the door knocks softly.

Considering that the door opens before she actually has a chance to tell the person to come in (or _don't _come in), she really shouldn't be surprised when a head of red tresses pops in. She is still kinda surprised though because Chloe hadn't tagged along on the wonderful shopping trip from hell and Beca hadn't seen her when they got back to the office either so she guesses she just kind of assumed that Chloe had gone home or something.

_Of course_ Chloe would just magically pop up when she thinking of changing her mind about this though; she's starting to wonder if that's Chloe's actual job within the Bellas—to tempt people in with her easy friendliness and then trap them in with her vampiric psychic timing and hypnotic eyes. (It's possible, she thinks; what with Aubrey's intense crazy constantly needing to be controlled, it's highly possible.)

"Hey," Chloe practically floats into the room, all soothing smile and unwarranted enthusiasm. "Car's here."

"Awesome," Beca drawls, absolutely clear in just how _not_ awesome she thinks it is.

Chloe smiles, soft and patient in that that way Beca probably shouldn't be so accustomed to already except Chloe must either think she's the most pitiful human being on planet Earth or must liken her to a small skittish animal because Beca's found herself on the receiving end of that smile often.

She, oddly enough, doesn't really mind it.

"You ready for this?" Chloe asks, smoothing her fingers over the cotton Beca has crinkled. (Beca probably shouldn't be accustomed to that either but she doesn't recoil from the sudden contact, so yeah; she's so not sure what that says about her.)

"Am I allowed to say no?" she asks—only slightly kidding—as she watches Chloe's fingers easily soothe over the damage she's made of her shirt.

"Sure," Chloe murmurs, airy and playful—light in their interaction like it's something they've been doing for years rather than days. "That is," Chloe continues, smiling open and teasing. "_If_ you're prepared for Aubrey to drag you to this thing herself."

"Oh God," Beca groans (just the thought of Aubrey dragging her anywhere else is terrifying). "In that case, I'm so ready! Never been more ready for anything in my entire life!"

Chloe laughs; she's so close—still determinedly tugging out the wrinkles in Beca's shirt—that Beca kind of feels the sound bounce off of her. She doesn't flinch away from that either— and she's so not analyzing what _that_ says about her.

"It won't be so bad," Chloe assures her, her teasing smile indicating that she definitely realizes how reminiscent of their earlier conversation her words are.

Beca raises a skeptical eyebrow because yeah, magnetic reassuring smile or not, she's totally not falling for that one again. _Nope_, absolutely not! Chloe totally said that before and then conveniently skipped out on being dragged into every store in West LA; this time Beca's preparing for the worse day of her life.

"I'm sure Aubrey's probably already given you the rundown," Chloe continues, pulling back to assess the shirt for more creases. "It's a really closed off event so you really won't need Cynthia Rose and Lily to accompany you," she explains, giving the fabric another smooth over before apparently deciding that it's fine or just damaged beyond her finger's repair. (Beca glances and it looks pretty fine.) "You'll at least have Amy with you," she offers as consolation, "to, you know, keep your company."

"Or wrestle a crocodile if need be,"

"There's also that," Chloe agrees, amused. "Here," She reaches for the headphones Beca's left has draped over the desk and hands them to her.

Beca shakes her head.

"Aubrey's already warned me not to wear those," she admits, rolling her eyes. "She feels that my usual "rebellious emo teenager" look won't make a great first impression."

Chloe scrunches her nose, clearly not in agreement with her partner's assessment—Beca doesn't know why, but that show of dissent (small as it is) kinda makes her heart pick up pace a little.

"Well, I think—" Chloe drawls, fitting the headphones delicately around Beca's neck. "that you being you will make the _best_ first impression," she insists, smoothing erratic strands of Beca's hair until they fall around the earpads of her headphones. Task complete, she gives her a playful nudge and wink. "I'll take the heat for this one."

"I doubt it," Beca mumbles, knowing that Aubrey will probably take her wearing her headphones as blatant disrespect for her professional authority or something and then use it as excuse to fuel her obvious dislike for her. Whatever; she'll deal with the wrath of Aubrey, the Almighty Publicist, later; right now, she smiles at Chloe; accepting the kind gesture. "But thanks," she murmurs genuinely. She didn't actually realize how off she felt without her headphones— she feels more _herself_ with them; safer with this passage to her musical outlet nestled safely against her clavicle.

"You'll probably need them anyway," Chloe admits. "Drunk celebrities are only entertaining for like the first ten minutes. After that, you're pretty much on your own."

"Wow, you're so not making me wanna skip out on this thing right now," Beca jokes.

"Well," Chloe unexpectedly tugs Beca's phone right from her front pocket (Beca's still not flinching and still not analyzing it). She watches curiously as Chloe taps away at her phone's touch screen, the redhead's lips curled into a mischievous smile. "My number," Chloe explains, tucking the phone back into Beca's pocket. "So, if you do get bored, you can text me."

"Right. Cool!"

Chloe predictably doesn't move away after the comment and Beca predictably—_not predictably_, what is she even thinking?—doesn't force her to.

There's probably something to be said about how at ease she is with Chloe completely invading her space like she has a penchant to but with Chloe _invading her space like she has a penchant to_, Beca kinda forgets that words exists.

"I—uhmmm—" She swears for a moment that Chloe actually gets closer; close enough that Beca can feel the weight of her every exhale; close enough that she can clearly make out the constellation of freckles that lightly dust the groove where's Chloe's neck meets her shoulder, close enough that—

"Hey DJ Beca! DJ Beca Becs. DJ Bec Bec!" Beca doesn't even realize how their proximity probably seems until Amy bounds into the room, her string of names for her (that's a thing Amy's picked up for fun—seeing just how many variations of new DJ names she can come up with for her) trailing off and her jaw dropping almost right to the ground.

Beca backs up so far she almost knocks over the mirror.

Chloe is, however, completely unaffected.

"Hey Amy!" she greets, as bubbly as ever. "Everything ok with the car?"

"Yeah!" Amy answers, way too quickly to be believable. "No," she admits after a moment. "See, the thing is," she hesitates, "the car I sent for _may_ or may not be a gang affiliated pimp mobile. But no worries! I just spoke to the driver and he said that as long as we don't have to drive through Crips territory, we're good! Anyway, he's ready to go when you are, Beca! But no hurries, if you want to continue what I just inter—"

"No, I'm ready!" Beca's quick to answer (too quick to be believable). "I'm ready," she repeats, tamer, but no more believable. "I just—" she glances at Chloe, taking in that soft, patient smile (like she's waiting for something; what could she possibly be waiting for?) and she sighs.

She's actually as closed to ready as she thinks she's ever gonna get.

TBC..


	6. Chapter 6

Chloe was wrong.

(Very wrong.)

(Eight whole minutes and an honest to God _open bar_ wrong!)

The thing is, drunk celebrities? They're only entertaining for like the first _two _minutes.

One minute in and Beca's already mildly annoyed. Her first conversation—with some English boy band guy who keeps messing up her name and takes little interest in anything she says about her music—results in nothing but Amy ditching her for the prospect of body shots off of what Beca has to admit are pretty killer abs.

Fifteen minutes in and 0 effective socializations down, she's seriously considering ditching this whole thing all together.

Thirty minutes in—still startlingly sober with _still_ approximately 0 effective conversations down—she caves and texts Chloe who, _of course_, manages to convince her to stay with little more than a smiley face and a "have you met Prince yet? His butt is so tiny that I can hold it with like one hand!" And _okay_, Beca does actively seek out Prince's backside after that (scarily enough, she's pretty sure it can fit in her hand and she has small hands) but that only takes up maybe a minute and she seriously isn't gonna just waltz up to _Prince_ and strike up conversation or anything.

In fact, there are a lot of people here she isn't willing to just waltz right up to and strike up conversation with, which is why, three hours in (0 effective conversations down), she finds herself outside, on a seriously lavish balcony—_just her and her headphones_. She knows what Chloe is trying to do with her random text messaged celebrity facts (and seriously, maybe that's Chloe's job with the Bellas—because Beca's seriously curious about what she actually does now and maybe scope out other celebrities is it, because how else would she know random things like Elton John's favorite drink or all of Jon Bon Jovi's kid's names?) but knowing these things really doesn't make Beca feel any less out of sorts here.

She just doesn't belong here. Even with her list of Aubrey appropriate subjects and without her "ear monstrosities" it's so obvious she doesn't fit in with these people.

She's never really cared about her image or the fame or the money; she's never cared about the parties or overindulging in expensive liquor. She's never cared about _this_. Any of this. This whole thing just isn't her and she honestly can't stand around and pretend that it is.

It's so much easier to settle into the music; to fall against the heavy cement of an intricately designed column and settle into the heavy bass flowing from her headphones.

She gets so lost in the beat—silently stripping apart the arrangement and adding her own melody— that she doesn't even realize that someone has joined her on the balcony until she hears a faint voice cut through her music.

She tugs the ear pads off of her ears, glancing behind her at the source of the interruption.

There's something strangely familiar about the guy standing behind her—something in that bright smile and those baby faced features— but she can't for the life of her figure out where she could have seen him before

"I know you!" The guy repeats himself, grinning in a way that doesn't necessarily put her at ease.

"No you don't!" She replies, instantly dismissive—she's sure if she did actually know him, she'd know where from.

"Yeah, I do." He insists anyway, apparently unperturbed by her dismissal. He sinks down onto the floor next to her, completely ignoring the glare of disapproval she sends his way. "You're the chick from that movie!" He persists and Beca furrows her eyebrows because no, definitely not her, and apparently this is her life now—being a magnet for crazies. "You know which movie!" He presses. "The one where the brooding wallflower meets the charming pop star at a party and then she falls madly in love with him."

She stares at him for a moment, trying to gauge if he's joking or just crazy—for her own sanity, she chooses to take it as a joke.

"That's not a movie," she guesses.

He laughs, easy and cordial; she seriously resists the urge to flinch at the friendly shoulder nudge he sends her way.

"It could be an amazing movie," he quips.

She rolls her eyes but he seems pretty harmless so she doesn't rebuff him completely.

"We clearly don't share the same definition of amazing," she says instead.

He laughs again, extending a hand for her to shake.

"I'm Jesse," he introduces himself.

That's totally enough to jog Beca's memory.

"You're Jesse?" She asks, thoroughly amused, because _seriously_, this is Jesse? This is the Jesse from all the magazines? The Jesse who girls are apparently besides themselves trying to throw their panties at? This is the Jesse she's supposed to be watching out for? "You're _pretty boy, teen heartthrob _Jesse?"

He folds his arms but he's apparently not too offended by her assessment because he's still smiling broadly.

"Why is that so funny to you?" He asks.

"I don't know. I just wasn't expecting you to be so…" she trails off, not really knowing how to explain it. It's not like she was expecting anything in particular—she honestly didn't even give it much thought— but at the same time she just doesn't see him as the type of guy that girls would be getting into catfights over; he's just so…

"Cute?" He fills in for her.

"Not the word I was looking for," she laughs.

He chuckles too, leaning back against the column so he's comfortable (clearly, he isn't planning on leaving her alone for now).

"So, what's your deal?" He asks after a moment.

"My deal?"

"Yeah. Like I haven't seen you around before and then you just show up all of a sudden all anti-social with your dark and mysterious brooding."

"I'm not brooding!" She defends.

He raises an eyebrow, an obvious dare to be honest.

She sighs.

"This isn't my kinda thing," she admits. "I kinda just want to go home."

"Well, what's stopping you?"

"I just—" she doesn't even know where to begin—not that she really wants to explain it anyway. Instead, she shrugs. "I dunno," she sighs. "Anyway, Amy, my—" Assistant ? Except she and Amy are negotiating a title and that sounds pompous anyway. Also, she's so not calling her her political advisor either because just no and she's totally avoiding anything she has to explain. "My, uhmmm, friend," she settles for. "She's having fun and I'm not gonna spoil someone else's fun because I'm kinda lame."

"You mean the girl you came with?" He asks.

She nods.

"Blonde?" He asks. She nods again. "Australian?" Another nod. "Very, very drunk?"

"Sounds like her."

"I'm pretty sure she's gone."

"Gone?"

"I saw her leave like an hour ago with that WBUJ jerk."

"What?" Beca asks, hopping to her feet to glance through the glass slide-in door. The party is still in full-swing but she seriously doesn't see Amy anywhere. "Are you serious?"

"Yep!" Jesse nods. "Problem?"

"Yeah. She was kinda my ride! Or she was the connection to my ride at least," she confesses.

"Oh wow." Jesse says, moving behind her. "Well, I was pretty much planning on calling it a night anyway," he admits. "You can catch a ride with me, if you want?"

He's smiling, genuinely helpful, but she knows she really shouldn't.

"No, it's alright," she refuses. She can just imagine Aubrey and that shrill annoyed tone she'll receive if the blonde ever knew she was even thinking about catching a ride with a "Treble." (She's really trying not to incur anymore of Aubrey's ire— not after that shopping trip.) "I'll just get a taxi or something. No big deal."

"Come on," He grins, excited and open (God, he's kinda like a giant puppy). "It's just a ride! I insist!"

Well, she kinda really does just wanna go home and _it is_ just a ride.

And okay, so maybe it's a ride in a limo the size of a bus with a pretty boy, teen heartthrob who her publicist says to stay away from at all costs but whatever; she's had a seriously long day and she's kinda ready to curl up in a ball and get some much needed sleep.

So, she has this strange feeling that someone's watching her throughout the whole ride; whatever, she figures it's just Aubrey invading her subconscious with her crazy.

* * *

The annoying chime of her cell phone jolts her out of her sleep.

She wants to just roll back over and snuggle her way back into dreamland but the goddamn thing won't stop ringing.

She blinding reaches to answer it and she regrets that decision almost instantly.

She barely gets out a sleepily muttered, "hello," before she gets a shrill and highly annoyed, "_office, A.S.A.P_," followed swiftly by the dial tone.

Her first glimpse of the day is the bright glaring glint of her alarm clock.

7:14. She groans.

This is clearly about to be the shittiest day ever.

She makes it to the office in what has to be record time considering that all she did was brush her teeth and haul on whatever clothes were nearest to her hands before heading out.

She drives into the parking garage, pulling in between a wall and this obnoxiously expensive sports car that she's pretty sure belongs to one of the balding guys in the law office next to the Bellas. (He's gotta be going through a midlife crisis or something.)

Whatever.

Nothing at all seems terribly amiss about today. She's pretty sure Aubrey's just gonna berate her for being a total social dimwit and only introducing herself to maybe one person last night and then they're gonna work out a way to get around her social awkwardness and hopefully it won't turn out to be another all day thing.

Except, something is off.

She realizes it instantly because the moment she steps out of the garage, she's flanked by Lily and Cynthia Rose which is _weird_; very weird.

"What's going on, guys?" she asks, mostly addressing Cynthia Rose because even if Lily did answer, she's sure she won't be able to hear it.

Cynthia Rose shrugs but it's clear it's not because she doesn't know but because she doesn't want to tell and either way, it's obvious that something is going on because Cynthia Rose is sticking close, leading while Lily guards her back.

They're actually acting like bodyguards, which once again is _weird_; _very weird_.

"Ok, seriously, what's up?" she asks, confused.

"Aubrey just wants us to make sure nobody followed you to the office," Cynthia Rose fills her in, opening the door to the office building and ushering her in.

"What do you mean followed me to the office? Why would someone follow me to the office?"

She doesn't get an answer but the moment she steps into the office she knows it's clearly because something's wrong (if the way Aubrey looks seriously close to puking is any indication, then something is _seriously wrong)_.

"Ok, what the hell is going on?"

"This is a PR-tastrophe!" Aubrey answers, shrill and irritated and panicked (and God, Beca can practically hear the bile rising).

"A what?" she asks, glancing around the room for a translation. Chloe's got her eyes buried in a magazine, not even making eye contact, Amy looks mildly nervous and Stacie looks oddly impressed. _No one answers her._ "Ok, seriously, someone is going to have to fill me in."

Aubrey slams a stack of magazines onto her desk and Beca moves to glance at them, gasping when she realizes just what she's looking at.

_Her face_. Everywhere. With bolded titles like, "Jesse's Girl" and "Jesse leaves party with mystery girl."

"I—"

"If you think this is bad, you should see what's on the internet," Aubrey mutters. "Honestly, all you had to do was talk to a few people and get your name out there; instead, you leave the party as a Treble's plaything! Jesus, of course you'd make a mess even Chloe can't clean up!"

"Aubrey," It's Chloe who speaks up, her tone soft and apologetic even though she's still avoiding Beca's eyes, which sucks even more than all of Aubrey's yelling. "Look, it's not that bad."

"It _is_ that bad!" Aubrey shrieks. "You know how the Trebles are; they're clearly out to embarrass us! They're—"

"That's not what this was." Beca interrupts, instantly defensive because seriously, she's done nothing wrong and even if she did, Aubrey doesn't need to be taking that tone with Chloe when it's clearly her she's pissed at. "I was just—I just needed a ride and Jesse—he was just being nice. It's nothing more than that!"

"Yes, and I'm sure Uni was perfectly nice as he was getting America's Sweetheart completely wasted before the Grammys!"

"Well, I'm not America's sweetheart," Beca points out.

"Well, right now you're nothing more than Jesse's sweetheart!" Aubrey yells, sharp and harsh, enough to shock even Stacie, who gasps a little. She seems to realize how out of line that was because she takes a deep breath and when she speaks again, it's still manic but less on the verge of puking her guts out. "I've done some snooping," she admits, pulling a stack of papers from the drawer of her desk. "And with Bumper on tour making sure John Mayer keeps his foot permanently out of his mouth, the Trebles have gotten a new publicist. I couldn't really find out about him but apparently he's all smoke and mirrors; he can make a story disappear like a magician. With Jesse's squeaky clean bachelor image, you'd think they'd be desperate to get rid of this but they're not. They're just letting it run like it's nothing. This is a Treble-crossing if I've ever seen one."

"I just—I don't see the big deal," Beca admits. Like, sure, it's about a million levels of unpleasant seeing her face plastered all over gossip magazines especially insinuating things that just aren't true but she didn't even tell Jesse who she is and even if she did, of all the things she could say about him after their meeting last night, cunning isn't even one that comes to mind, so this just doesn't make any sense to her. "I mean, they don't even know who I am," she points out. "Right now I'm just _mystery girl_."

"Exactly, _today_ you're mystery girl! Tomorrow the media gets a hold of your name; the next day it's your address, then where you went to school, then embarrassing Facebook photos, etc, etc. In a week, they know exactly who you are and they've dictated your public image before you've even had a chance to!"

She has a point; Beca didn't think of it like that, but Aubrey definitely has a point.

"Not exactly," Stacie declares, drawing the eyes of everyone in the room. "Okay, so one time in high school," she begins to explain. "There was this girl who thought I slept with her boyfriend, Robbie; so she corners me in a hallway one day—which, you know, buy me a drink first or something—and she starts saying how she's gonna tell the whole school how I slept with Robbie _and_ James and Edgar and Phil. So clearly, none of that's true because I only slept with Robbie and James' brother, Johnny, and Edgar and Aaron and Nathan but I figured that if she said it first, of course everyone would believe her. So during lunch, I hop onto a table and I'm just like, "excuse me guys. I'm gonna confess something that none of you know about me; I have a lot of sex. I can't help it; he's a hunter, you know?" and everybody just kept eating lunch like nothing happened. So, moral of the story: nobody cared because I admitted it first."

"I—" Beca weighs Stacie's words carefully, subtracting the sexual nature of it all (and ignoring how smug Stacie is about the sexual nature of it) and relating it to her situation. "She's right," she decides even though she can't believe she's even saying it, especially when everyone else appears so speechless. "I mean, bad example but she's right! What if we beat the media to it?"

Aubrey is oddly quiet but just as oddly contemplative.

"We'd have to work fast—by the end of the week at least," she says finally. "And we'd have to do something big—something that will get lots of media coverage. And even then, we'd still have to deal with this Treble situation."

"But it could work?" Beca asks, not even sure why she's so hopeful, not right now, not when the delusion of choice about this whole things has finally been stripped from her.

"It could," Aubrey admits. "I can start making phone calls and see what I can come up with and then we can all meet back here tomorrow, 8 AM, _sharp_!" She declares, back to her usual resolute crazy. "Chloe, can you keep track of this from home?" she asks, gesturing to the magazines. Chloe nods, smiling softly (she's still yet to meet Beca's gaze). "And can _you_ lay low until tomorrow?" Aubrey addresses her and Beca nods too, mostly just to get this over with so she can finally get Chloe to address her.

Aubrey is apparently convinced that this can actually work without dragging the Bellas' name further into the dirt because she finally lets them go.

Beca catches Chloe right before she's out the door.

"Hey Chloe, can I talk to you for a second?" she asks, which is stupid because she's not even sure what she has to say but whatever, it works because Chloe at least acknowledges her.

"You can walk me to my car, if you want?" she says, shrugging. "I can show you the back way to the parking lot. You might need to escape the paps soon," she jokes, smiling, even though it's hardly as easy as her usual smile.

Beca nods, but she doesn't say anything, at least not until they're like halfway to the parking lot (Chloe's taking her the same long, roundabout way she took her when she walked her to her car that first day) and she's pretty sure if she doesn't say anything soon, then she's just not gonna say anything at all.

"Look, are you mad at me too?" She starts, quick to cover up the actual worry that worms its way into her voice. "'Cause I swear I wasn't trying to create some "PR-tastrophe" or whatever," _Especially if she knew that it would be Chloe's mess to clean up _(if she actually knew that was what Chloe does, she'd probably have been more mindful not to fuck up). "I was just tired," she explains "and I couldn't find Amy and I needed a ride and I honestly just wanted to go home," she's rambling, but Chloe's not saying anything and she's not sure she can deal with silence right now. "Jesse offered and that was it! He's nice and whatever but all the extra press or that comes with him, I don't want that. I don't—"

"I'm not mad at you," Chloe interjects.

Beca purses her lips because yeah, Chloe has a seriously funny way of showing just how happy she is with her right now.

"Well, you barely looked at me back there," she points out.

Chloe stops at Beca's car—which is weird because Beca thought she was walking Chloe to hers but whatever, she's less preoccupied on where they are and far more preoccupied with the way Chloe's frowning. It kind of reminds her of the first day when Chloe walked her to her car, when Chloe told her she didn't sing anymore and Beca could swear she could even see the bright blue of her eyes dull at the admission.

This might actually be worse. At least then there was that confession. (Beca still doesn't get it completely—she's still not sure she can even ask—but she knows that whatever it is that makes Chloe feel like she can't sing anymore is something that makes her sad; she knows it's a subject to tread lightly over.)

This is something different entirely. She's not sure where this sadness is stemming from, only that it's right in front of her and she has no idea what it's about or how she can stop it. She wants nothing more to stop it.

"Just," Chloe sighs, like she's not quite sure where to begin herself. "Just be careful, ok?" she warns, her tone thick and fluid—it's like the sudden sadness has even invaded her vocal cords. "This business is—" she shakes her head, pursing her lips like she's saying all the wrong things. "Some people just aren't who you think they are, alright?"

Beca has this weird feeling that Chloe's not limiting her statement to this whole Jesse situation because there's that frown and her eyes are the most turbulent shade of blue Beca's ever seen but Beca doesn't know what to ask, or if she can ask—not with the way Chloe's frowning; not with the way she seems to be retreating into her own mind (Beca's sure that's a place she can't be welcome)— so she just fakes a smile instead.

"Yeah, totally," she agrees. "I get that," she says—and she does get it (she knows Los Angeles is full of people faking it to make it) but at the same time she's not sure she gets it in the way Chloe does; she's not sure she'll ever understand it the way Chloe apparently does.

"Good," Chloe hugs her, flinging her arms around her neck and pulling her close. The way she sighs into the side of Beca's neck is anything but happy but when she pulls back, she smiling, soft and patient (like she waiting for something; Beca still for the life of her can't figure out what she could be waiting for). "Also, next time you need a ride, doesn't even matter where, just text me, ok?" she says, giving Beca a friendly nudge with her elbow. "That's what friends are for, right?"

_Friends_—there's the name for the weird feeling of dissemblance she got when she was positive that Chloe was mad at her and that's probably the reason behind that weird sinking feeling in her chest at Chloe's frown too.

She's not even sure when it happened or how it happened so quickly but she finds herself not at all minding the label Chloe's slapped on this thing between them.

Whatever.

That doesn't make her lame or anything.

"Yeah," She matches Chloe's smile with a genuine one of her own.

It would probably be like a moment or whatever but the obnoxiously expensive sport cars next to hers unlocks and she glances behind her, expecting to see the uptight, aging, balding lawyer from next door.

He doesn't come.

In fact, there's no one else around.

"Dude!" Her eyes are probably comically wide or something but seriously, she's shocked. "This is your car?" She asks, eyeing the vehicle carefully—it's sleek and black, all sharp metallic angles like it might just be from some racetrack of the future (psychic, time traveling, hypnotic, creativity sucking vampire?)

"Yeah," Chloe answers, shrugging like it's no big deal.

It's kind of a big deal.

"I hate to tell you this, but I think you're going through an early midlife crisis," Beca jokes—or half-jokes, because well, yeah! "Or you're Batman!" she jumps to the next logical conclusion. "Jesus!" she shakes her head, still surveying the deathtrap. "Is this one of those cars that are like obnoxiously loud?" she asks, genuinely curious. Chloe laughs, opening the front door—it seriously opens up and out—and sticking the key in the engine. The resulting sound is enough to reverberate through the parking garage. "You totally have to give me a ride home one day just to rev the engine to annoy my roommate!" She declares. (Just imagining Kimmy Jin's face is totally priceless.)

Chloe chuckles, her cheeks tinted red with her amused.

"It's a plan," she promises, laughing vibrant and easy—the sound wraps around Beca, makes her feel warm and lightheaded.

Whatever.

That's a friends thing, right?

And the fact that all it takes is Chloe laughing to brighten what had the potential to be the shittiest day in the history of her life, well, she guesses that's kind of what friends are for too, right?

TBC…


End file.
